Wednesday, July 08, 2009

The Rajapaksa interview

The Hindu is carrying an interview with the Sri Lankan president. Most of his answers are politically correct and are what we want to hear -- man, he's one smooth operator, alright -- but this one exposes his true colours:

Q: There has been international concern over the assaults and pressures on journalists in Sri Lanka. Some of these journalists were your personal friends, especially Lasantha Wickrematunge [Editor of The Sunday Leader] who was gunned down in January 2009. Then, in June, a Tamil woman journalist [Krishni Ifhan née Kandasamy of Internews] was abducted in Colombo by unidentified persons [who questioned her for several hours before releasing her in Kandy].

A: Most of these cases were created, I would say. If you fight someone in the street and that man comes and hits you, can the government take responsibility? But we have not done anything against journalists even when they attack us.

Nice dodge.

BTW, in case you haven't done so already, go and read 'And then they came for me', Lasantha Wickrematunge's voice from beyond the grave -- without doubt the most poignant thing I've read in a long while.